01.05.2015
In 1982, Argentina, beset by its own economic woes and looking for a way to rally its people around the flag, launched a surprise attack on the Falkland Islands, a British crown colony since 1840 and occupied sporadically by British forces fordecades before. The invasion caught the British—and the world—bysurprise. Great Britain, which once controlled an empire upon which the sun never set and which once controlled the high seas, was caught flatfooted. Domestic entitlements had eroded Britain’s military budget for years, as did a false sense of security that the age of outright military aggression had ended. In short, British policymakers had allowed their military power to decline precipitously. The British military had to lease Cunard cruise line’s Queen Elizabeth II to transport troops to the islands. In the end, the British reconquered the islands, but took far greater casualties than it would have had it been militarily prepared. Then again, had the Argentine junta believed Britain was more than a paper tiger, it likely would not have invaded the Falklands in the first place.
Fast forward more than three decades. British military strength is now at a nadir, lower than it has been in decades if not centuries relative to the rest of the world. Meanwhile, Argentina is once again in a morass of its own making. The Argentine economy is again in the dumps; it defaulted on its loans last year for the second time in just 13 years, and the rich are fleeing the country.
Argentine President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner has responded Hugo Chavez-style, by voicing outlandish plots that go from the ridiculous to the sublime. While Kirchner is term limited, there are ways around such legal obstacles when presidents put ego above the law. At the very least, Kirchner has been maneuvering to place her son in the presidency, continuing the family dynasty that started with Néstor Carlos Kirchner, her late husband, in 2003.
Through it all, the Argentine government has begun making noises again with regard to its claim that the Falkland Islands, which it calls the Islas Malvinas, should return to it by any means necessary. In 2013, rhetoric in Argentina again reached a fever pitch. During the 1982 crisis, the Reagan administration briefly considered neutrality before siding with its British allies. In 2015, Argentina would be right to question whether there is any such resolve in the White House. President Obama has used (or tried to use) the Argentine name for the islands. Kirchner has interpreted Obama’s about-face on Cuba as evidence that such a reversal could be in store for the Falklands. “If the Yankees took 53 years to say that Fidel Castro is right, how would they not sit down to discuss something that everyone is calling for,” she asked. Add to this the New York Times, which uses its space to sponsor debates about whether to accede or compromise with Argentina’s demands. Regardless, even if Obama were to give his firmest red line against Argentine military adventurism, it is doubtful anyone in Argentina or back in America would believe him.
Then, of course, there is also oil and gas. There has long been suspicion that the Falklands sat above and in the midst of tremendous oil and gas reserves. No longer is this simply suspicion. The decline in the price of oil makes Falkland energy less economical to exploit, but what goes down does rise up and a desperate Argentina might do anything.
Is it likely that Argentina will again play the aggressor? No, but then again most everyone agreed it unlikely that Argentina would invade the first time in 1982 or that Iraq would invade Kuwait in 1990, or that Russia would invade Ukraine in 2014. The point is that the British navy has never been weaker, the United States doesn’t have its ally’s back, and weakness invites aggression whereas populism often invites it. What once seemed impossible is now in the realm of the possibility.
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